BYU football ekes out a win at Ole Miss
The BYU football era of independence began with an ugly win. But then again, a W is always a lot more pretty than an L in sports. BYU overcame a mistake prone and largely ineffective day on offense and pulled out a 14-13 win over Ole Miss in Oxford MS with a lot of help from the defense.
Fans were no doubt surprised that BYU’s offense had accounted for -7 points heading into the 4th quarter of this game (0 points scored and an interception for a touchdown). QB Jake Heaps was mediocre for most of the day missing several wide open receivers. The BYU offense made enough plays to control the ball for most of the game but not enough plays to actually score until the 4th quarter. On the other hand the BYU defense gave up only 6 points the whole game on two field goals. Then in the 4th quarter with BYU trailing 13-7 outside linebacker Kyle Van Noy sacked the Ole Miss quarterback causing a fumble and then scooped the ball up and scored the touchdown the in the end proved to be the game winner.
It was a nail biter for BYU but it was still a win. BYU now has a week to figure out how to put more points on the board because the Cougs head to Austin Texas to play the Longhorns in front of 100,000+ orange-clad fans next Saturday.
Notes:
– It was a thoroughly mediocre showing by new offensive coordinator Brandon Doman I thought. Besides the fact that there were too many penalties on mental errors, I thought Doman had the tempo way too slow. I was wishing BYU had the no-huddle speed from past years.
– Mediocre showing by the special teams as well. A shanked punt (for 11 yards), missed short FG, and a long Ole Miss kickoff return all hurt BYU.
– Stellar play by the BYU front seven on defense. Ole Miss thought they could run on BYU behind their huge offensive line. Ole Miss thought wrong. Plus the defense caused two turnovers on fumbles.
– Oh how I LOVE to watch games in HD on ESPN. This new BYU partnership with ESPN is wonderful for fans.
– BYU missed Josh Quezada in this game. TV said he was suffering severe headache and thus sat out.
– Not a lot out of the big receivers from BYU but Apo did catch the lone BYU touchdown so it was quality over quantity in his case.
Chime in bloggernacle BYU fans — what did you think of the game today?
Fully agreed on all points, especially the quality of defense and the failure to go up-tempo. I especially thought our two outside linebackers looked stupendous. I hope Heaps can get his stuff together soon so that we can take advantage of our big receivers.
I thought the lone bright spot on offense was Di Luigi.
Comment by Ben Park — September 3, 2011 @ 6:01 pm
Yep, Diluigi’s performance always seems to warrant more accolades and attention than he gets from BYU fans online. Kid just delivers.
Comment by Geoff J — September 3, 2011 @ 6:28 pm
Agreed on all points. If we play like this in Austin next weekend, we’re in trouble. The silver lining, I suppose, is that BYU’s troubles today were caused by careless but fixable mistakes and not by lack of talent or experience (as seemed to be the case at the beginning of last year).
I was impressed with the D, but as always I worry about our secondary, who will be tested against UT’s passing attack next week.
Comment by Christopher — September 3, 2011 @ 6:44 pm
The good news about Texas is they have not been able to settle on a starting QB throughout Fall camp. Hopefully that is because none of the candidates were really impressing. I agree that a really good passing attack could mean real trouble for the BYU defense.
Comment by Geoff J — September 3, 2011 @ 6:52 pm
Also, the whole thing about pickle juice was just weird.
Comment by Ben Park — September 3, 2011 @ 7:18 pm
I love the weirdness of the pickle juice thing. Regional quirks are one of the great things about college football.
Comment by Geoff J — September 3, 2011 @ 7:23 pm
Other than Diluigi it seemed like RB were frequently out of position. Very mediocre all around. But what amazed me was how we still dominated the game – until we’d get in the red zone. And the kicker missing on the 5 yard line? What?
Hopefully they practice how to behave in the red zone and hopefully Heaps calms down. He made a lot of rookie mistakes and he’s not a rookie anymore.
Comment by Clark — September 3, 2011 @ 7:41 pm
On the numbers, all in all, BYU actually managed to look good.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/football/ncaa/gameflash/2011/09/03/47866_teamstats.html
Comment by Stephen M (Ethesis) — September 3, 2011 @ 8:08 pm
A win is never ugly! First step on a glorious road for BYU football!
Comment by Kris — September 3, 2011 @ 8:26 pm
EEK! It’s all about money!
But I think you meant “eke”.
Comment by Mark B. — September 4, 2011 @ 7:11 pm
Doh!
Thanks for pointing out that typo Mark. Fixed.
Comment by Geoff J — September 4, 2011 @ 7:54 pm
Speaking of money and college football, if it is not too far off topic, what do you all think of this?
Comment by Mark D. — September 4, 2011 @ 9:54 pm
Yeah the free minor league system that is college football and basketball has evolved into somewhat of an unwieldy monster. Not sure things are broken enough yet for the country to demand change though.
Comment by Geoff J — September 4, 2011 @ 10:05 pm
A short video on the pickle juice thing made by one of my students last year:
http://www.spj.org/moe10-video.asp?v=tv-feature-4&w=640&h=385
Comment by Chad Too — September 5, 2011 @ 8:47 pm
I am not sure exactly how good Ole Miss really is. I think though that I saw a 7-5 or 8-4 BYU team on the field.
The bright spot was the Defense. They played tough, really tough.
Heaps is not ready yet for a 11 win season. He needs another season. Then look out next year or two.
Comment by bbell — September 6, 2011 @ 3:29 pm
Lets hope Heaps picks it up this weekend. The second coming of Ty Detmer he is not. Of course I’ve gotten to the point where I don’t even bother with the pre-season analysis of players since so much is hyped up. There’s a big difference between practice and play.
Still if the receivers, RBs and Heaps can calm down a bit and stick to their positions they could still gel really nicely.
Agree that Ole Miss isn’t a great team though. This weekend could get ugly unless they really step it up.
Comment by Clark — September 9, 2011 @ 8:01 am
The Texas game was so close …
Comment by Stephen M (Ethesis) — September 10, 2011 @ 7:34 pm